When Francis Ford Coppola’s grandfather, Agostino, was a child growing up in the small town of Bernalda in Southern Italy, he often played among ancient Greek ruins in nearby Metaponto, where thousands of years earlier stood a school run by the legendary Greek scholar Pythagoras — Pitagora, in Italian. Known today for his mathematical theorem (a2 + b2 = c2), Pythagoras was more than a mathematician; he was a philosopher who sought new ways of understanding the world through mathematics, astronomy, and music theory. Growing up in the footprint of this legend, Agostino developed a talent for mathematics and music, and his Pythagorean curiosity about the nature of how things work went on to influence each generation of Coppola.